BITAG to Take Holistic Look at Data Protection

The Broadband Internet Technical Advisory Group (BITAG) said it will come up with best practices for data collection and privacy online.

The group's diverse membership includes Public Knowledge, Disney, Cisco, NCTA-The Internet & Television Association and CableLabs.

BITAG said its technical working group will review the technical aspects of data collection and privacy, and issue a report in early 2018 that includes "appropriate best practices."

The group is responding to what it called a "significant gap" between the perception and reality of data collection practices, much of it focused on "one set of actors" -- that would be ISPs rather than the edge, at least in the mind of ISPs like those represented by NCTA.

BITAG said it will take a more holistic look at all those involved, including ISPs, edge providers, ad networks, app developers and equipment manufacturers. The group is looking to inform the discussion with more tech-centered info, essentially its stock in trade.

Lead editors on the report will be Jason Livingood of Comcast and Nick Feamster, a computer science professor at Princeton. Heading up the review will be Douglas Sicker, chair of BITAG's technical working group. He is head of the Engineering and Public Policy Department at Carnegie Mellon.

BITAG is the multistakeholder group formed to find consensus on broadband network management practices and related technical issues and educate policymakers.